


Soft

by ThisWasInevitable



Series: Falling [11]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Light Angst, M/M, Reader request, fuff, indruck, local bear loves disaster moth, mothman cuddles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-23
Updated: 2019-08-22
Packaged: 2020-09-24 10:08:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20356717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThisWasInevitable/pseuds/ThisWasInevitable
Summary: After moving in together, Duck and Indrid experience many moments of softness.Here are two.





	1. Comfort

**Author's Note:**

> A reader requested: Mothman cuddles? Yes. Soft soft indruck? Yes. Please. It is my life essence. 
> 
> We are also setting up what will be the next long fic in "Falling"

Duck tosses the keys into the dish by the door, humming. Toes of his shoes, nudges the pair of Crocs from where they’ve strayed too far into the entryway, no doubt from Indrid kicking them off in a hurry. 

“Hey fluffball” he murmurs to Winnie as she jumps up onto the counter, yowling her demands for headscritches. He indulges her as he sorts through the mail.

Funny, Indrid is usually to him by now. Ever since they’ve moved in together, the Sylph will greet him when he gets home from work, assuming he’s home and not out at the library or getting something from Leo’s. Sometimes it’s merely turning around to smile at him from his desk, others it’s him opening the door before Duck puts his hand on it. He’ll grin at him, that expression that Duck once thought was odd but now can’t imagine his days without, then kiss him if the mood is right. 

This was the part he hadn’t expected about living together; the way the rhythms of his day are intertwined with Indrids', how noticeable it is when they’re interrupted. 

He’s learned to notice other things too.

Like when the pile of blankets and pillows by the T.V (Indrids' nest, as Duck has taken to calling it) is more Indrid-shaped than normal. And what that generally means.

He steps around the edge of the couch.

“Hey, darlin.”

A soft chirr in response, but the blankets stay put. He kneels down

“If you’re nappin I can leave you be-oh jesus.” He wasn’t expecting Indrids Sylph form to peek out at him, antenna barely twitching in recognition. 

“Sorry, startled me. Feel like goin' au naturale today?” He keeps his voice gentle and light, settles his back against the nearest pillow.

“I do not wish to be a human. I do not wish to be me at all, but going back to my most basic form is the next best thing.”

Duck glances at the far wall, focusing on the corkboard over Indrids desk. Even from here, he can see that many of the drawings are of disaster. On the table, next to the phone, is a pad of numbers, and Ducks laptop is nearby. Indrid’s hand must’ve been shaking when he wrote the later numbers on the pad, he can tell by the wild scribbles, can make out "30 dead" on one of the sheets of paper. 

Most tellingly, there are large slashes through many of the drawings, some having been deep enough to tear at the board. 

“You wanna talk about?” Duck carefully slips his hand under the pile of blankets, searching until he touches familiar down, smooths it with his fingers.

“No.” The antenna are threatening to disappear back under the mounds of fabric

Duck thinks for a moment; he hates seeing Indrid like this. But he’s learned that the Sylph often has to work through it at his own speed. 

“Okay. I’m gonna make dinner real quick, then was gonna watch T.V for a bit. Want me to bring you anythin?”

“Juice. Please.”

Duck heads to the kitchen, opts for the most efficient option and pours himself a bowl of cereal, grabs one of the six million bottles of juice from the fridge, and then returns to the floor by the couch.

“Got you pineapple.”

“Thank you.” A clawed hand emerges and Duck places the bottle into it. The hand retreats, and a moment later there’s the strange, rapid lapping noise of Indrid drinking.

Duck switches on the T.V, fiddles with the DVD player. He and Indrid have been working through a cartoon series Aubrey recommended (or, more accurately, had demanded Duck watch, up to driving him down to the library and checking it out for him). It’s a little more brightly colored than Duck’s used too, and he’s not a huge fan of the songs, but he likes the weird humor, likes that the title character struggles with feeling like has a destiny he didn’t want. 

A week or so ago, they’d been watching an episode where are character explains how she can see the future as rivers, dividing and pooling off into different timelines. He looked over to find Indrid staring, open mouthed and wide-eyed, at the screen.

“How did they know that’s what it’s like?” 

As the theme song kicks in, feathery antenna tickle his ribs through his shirt as Indrid pokes his head out. Duck finishes his cereal, sets the bowl aside so Indrid can settle his head in his lap. With every episode, more of Indrid appears from under the blankets, Indrid shifting the pillows as he adjust, eventually sitting up and wrapping one wing around Ducks shoulder. 

Duck idly brushes the feathers, straightening the ones that were ruffled from whatever stress his boyfriend was under earlier. Indrid even purrs a little, chirps out a few laughs at the action onscreen.

They reach an episode, and as the future seeing character and the main character discover a litter of kittens. 

_“Lately, I’ve felt so lost”_

And then a moment later

_“You created a future so improbable that I didn’t see it coming at all."_

_“Everyone’s looking to me for answers and I can’t stand it. It’s so hard for me to just exist in the first place, Steven. I want to love being alive, I want to love that there are so many possibilities. But I’m the one with this ability, so I’ve got to be our guide.”_

A strange sound is coming from his right. Indrid is chirring sadly, but it’s interrupted, as if he has the hiccups. His antenna are flattened limply on his head. His wing is heavy on Ducks shoulder and back, as if he’s having trouble supporting his own limbs in even the simplest ways.

“Darlin?”

Indrid buries his face in his hands. 

“I tried so hard. I try, and try, but what happens with you all is the rare exception. So often I’m too late, or no one listens and I have to watch it happen over and over again in my mind and then it happens, and I have to watch as it ripples out into dozens and dozens of futures spilling over with grief and loss and pain from what I failed to stop and I will never be enough to stop it. And yet I ought to, no one else on earth and very few on Sylvain share my power, but I do so little with it.”

The short, sobbing chirrs are needles in Ducks heart, little stings of sympathy radiating out into the rest of him. 

They’ve had variations on this conversation before, often in the wake of a tragedy in which Indrid tried to intervene. He’s pretty sure they will have them until one or both of them dies. Deep down, he knows that there’s a chance that nothing he says will ever be enough, that nothing will stick. He’ll never know what it’s like in Indrids mind, what the man he loves has to tune out just to get through the day. Indrids powers come with downsides, and one of them is that he may be fated to suffer vicariously, to feel helpless time and again, forever.

Good thing Duck’s never put much stock in fate.

He pulls Indrid into his arms, the Sylph not so much folding to fit as flopping onto him. They must make a ridiculous sight, Duck doing his best to hold Indrids head against the crook of his neck, to cradle him close even as his wings and long limbs are sprawled at odd angles. 

“Indrid, you know what I’m gonna say-”

“Now is _not_ the time for seer jokes-”

“Lemme finish: you know what I’m gonna say because it ain’t all that different from what I’ve said before. And I’m gonna keep sayin it every time you need to hear it, because I love you and that means arguin with your thoughts when they’re tellin you bullshit. It ain’t on you to stop every disaster, even though I think it’s damn noble that you keep tryin. You done a lot of good in your life, Indrid Cold, and I don’t doubt you’ll keep doin it.”

Indrid is now literally trying to crawl all seven feet and lord knows how many pounds of himself into Ducks lap, his chirr one of disbelieving sadness (though now free of sobs).

“Your worth ain’t just your powers, and I’ll fight anyone who tries to tell you different. Your the love of my goddamn life, and I’ll spend all night listin of why you’re great if that’s what it takes.”

A soft, chirping laugh breezes along his neck.

“Please don’t. We both need our rest, and you are stubborn enough that you would indeed stay up all night complimenting me just to prove your point.”

“Damn right.” Duck smiles, nuzzles the top of Indrids head, then promptly sneezes.

“Sorry.” Indrid lifts his head, meets his eyes for the first time all night, “and thank you, my love. Believe it or not, this gets to me much less than it used to. Perhaps” one clawed finger strokes tenderly across Ducks cheekbone, “because I do not have to face it alone.”

“Never again, darlin.” He kisses the closest mandible, grins when he spies Indrids antenna perking back up.

“Can we keep watching?” Indrid asks quietly. 

“Fine by me. You want me to keep cuddlin you?”

Indrid cocks his head, thinking, “can I...hold you?” He clicks his claws together, a nervous tic that Duck still finds endearing. 

“Anytime.”

They adjust, each laying to face the T.V, Indrid pulling Duck into his arms and wings as if he’s a teddy bear, chin resting atop his head. Duck rubs the smooth chitin on Indrids hands, enjoying how cool it feels on his skin. Indrid hums, pressing Duck closer, the low noise eventually shifting into a purr as Duck strokes his wings. 

By the time the final episode plays, they’re both deep in a mercifully peaceful sleep.


	2. Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Indrid tells Duck about his home.

It’s one of the warmest nights of the year, and Duck is lounging on the couch in his tanktop and shorts as Indrid, in his Sylph form, sorts through a box of old sketchbooks, one of the final things he has to unpack from the deceased Winnebago. 

“Y’mind if I look at some of ‘em?”

“Of course not. They’re mostly compilations of futures, or, I suppose, pasts at this point.”

“No embarasin drawins of me with hearts around my face?”

“Of course not” Indrid primly brushes dust from his arm, “I keep any, shall we say, _private_ drawings in a specific book. By the way, I really ought to sketch you naked one of these days. I have a few visions saved where you’re that way, but it’s very different from having one where you permitted me to draw you like that.”

Duck is not so busy blushing and choking on his water as to miss the smirk on Indrids face. 

He flips open the top book. Indrids not kidding when he says it’s mostly a collection of random images, many lacking context to such a degree that Duck wonders why they were saved in the first place. 

On the floor, Indrid crinkles up a drawing, then flicks it across the ground for Winnie to pursue. 

Duck picks up a worn, sky-blue book, bound in what looks like leather. This one appears to have a theme: mothpeople. Page after page contains portraits or slice of life style drawings of Indrids kind. He’s even gone so far as to color a bits of them. By the time he hits the middle of the book, the drawings have branched out to include buildings, one in particular appearing multiple times. 

He flips back to the beginning, goes through more carefully. There are several mothpeople who show up in more than one drawing. 

“Indrid? You sure you wanna get rid of this one?”

“I…” Indrid registers which books Duck is holding and his face does something unreadable, no mean feat given how well Duck has gotten to know his expressions, “No, I don’t believe I do.”

“This is your family, isn’t it?” Duck murmurs. 

Indrid nods and Duck rolls off the couch, shifting gracelessly on the floor to settle between Indrids legs, back resting against his chest. 

“Will you tell me about ‘em?”

Indrid takes the book, holding it open in one hand and turning the pages with the tip of one claw. 

“This” he points to a portrait of mothperson with dark wings and a rather severe set to his mandibles, “is my father.”

Another page, another portrait, this one of a mothperson where the stripes in their wings have been colored red, “is my mother.”

The next image is very different; it’s of a large, flowering shrub, with a pair of large eyes and grey antenna peeking out it.

“My sibling” Indrid says with a smile, “they thought they were being very sneaky indeed.”

He turns the page, and Duck feels his heart fill with a familiar glow.

“I’ll be, it’s teenage Indrid.”

“How did you-”

“Patterns on your wings, and, uh, I guess the way your face looks. It ain’t like you all look the same anyway, but I’d be a real dipshit if I couldn’t recognize my own boyfriend.”

Indrid lets out a quiet, happy chirr, wings draping over Ducks shoulders. It’s a little uncomfortable given how hot it is in the living room, but Duck wouldn’t shrug them off even if he started melting. 

“Was this before or after you left for the court?” 

“Shortly before. It was actually my attempt at, hmm, let me think of a comparison...prom photo, perhaps? Maybe a senior portrait, like that one your sister showed me”

“She did what now?” Damn that woman. 

“Nevermind, though the blue in your hair you have now is better than the green you had then. Anyway, I decided to make one for myself, because at that point I was already in training to be seer. I was no longer able to do as my peers did, both because of time and because they were trying to instill in me a sense of duty.”

“So you didn’t get to go to, I dunno, moth-prom and things like that?”

“Indeed. I had to forgo many common courtship things that younger sylphs of my kind do. But it wasn't all bad. Somewhere I think there is, um, ah, here it is.” The image takes up two pages, and is the only one Ducks seen that’s fully colored. It’s a panorama looking down at a neighborhood houses in shapes that still feel alien to Ducks eyes, each lit with a warm glow beneath a dark, purple-blue sky full of stars. 

“I drew this the night before I left. It was the view from my favorite place in the whole town. I” he takes a deep breath, and Duck squeezes his free hand, the gesture as automatic as breathing, “I was afraid that as my powers grew, I’d start forgetting things that were important, because my mind wouldn’t be able to hold everything at once. I know now that’s not exactly the case, but I was terrified I’d lose my memories of home.” He sets the book aside, cuddling Duck with a sigh.

“You ever miss home?” 

Indrid chirps, unequivocal, “I suppose there are things about there that I feel nostalgia for from time to time, or that I'd like to see again.”

He turns Duck easily in his arms, wings still folded around them and hands tilting his face so they’re gazing at each other, “But I do not miss home, my love. Because I am not gone from home. Here his home.” He presses their foreheads together, “_you_ are home.”

Duck tries to giggle to disguise the crack in his voice, “you big old sap.”

“Indeed, but you love me for it.”

Duck holds tight, feels the soft feathers, the way they perfectly coat the strength beneath. Breathes in the smell of of dust and vanilla bodywash, the one now sitting on the edge of his tub. Beneath the hum Indrid is sending into the room, there's a faint heartbeat, the one Duck knows as surely as his own name that he wants to forever mingle with his own.

“That I do, darlin. That I do.”


End file.
